lighting strikes and phone line

I have been in this house 3 years. During that period lightning has came in on the phone line destroying a portable hand held phone (two phones prior to me arriving), three computer modems, a computer printer and two heart machine monitors. All at different time periods.

When I call the problem phone # for the phone carrier I get some one that says we don't deal with that. Any suggestions or ideas. I currently have the phone line for my computer going through a electric bar that supposedly will protect my modem and we no longer use a portable phone.

TrapperKent

Kent
my suggestion would be that you call in a trouble ticket (customer service) and state something else as the issue and state that you need to meet with the tech for access to the premises. They should then schedule the visit and be able to talk to you in person. The company will likely not ever take responsibility for anything like that as it to easy to get pigeon holes for them as well. It can be an issue in the network on their behalf or poor luck on your behalf. That is the only way to get it through the office side of things though. If you talk to a tech let them know the issue and what has been going on. If they are capable they will know what to look for. It may likely cost you a tech visit fee or trouble ticket fee depending on the carrier but will get the issue looked at. Other than that the phone company in general will not claim internal lightning issues as their own issue from the customer service side of things usually.

everything that enters you house should have a surge protector not just the power at the appliance.

cable
antenna
phone
power

where these enter the house drive 2 ground rods 6 feet apart connect them with 4 guage copper wire and clamps run that up to where your phone lines and such enter the house put the surge protectors on each line before entering the house and tie all the ground wires tot eh 4ga copper wrap them and a big wire nut or clamp.

ground everything you can

make sure the ground to your breaker box is still good , you can also add a surge protection device to your breaker box.

check that you have a good ground at your outlet , there is a small plug in tester to easily check this plug it in it tells you if the outlet has ground and if the neutral hot are backwards with a set of lights.

current can be induced on internal wiring and that will hopefully be handled by the surge protector at the device , but shunting that current to ground before it enters your home adds layers to your defense.

not at all uncommon to see a phone or cable interface box that has a ground screw and the installer never installed the ground wire .

That does sound like lack of a good ground rod. I delt with this at my last job. They could have bought a semi load of ground rods and installed them and I still don't think it would have been enough. Every tire there was a storm there was thousands in burned electronics

First, check your electrical panel band make sure all grounds and neutrals are in their right spot and snugly connected. Then Call your power company, have em check your lightning arrestor on your transformer. Also ask if you can have them test the resistance in your ground rods. State that you’ve burned up a phones, modems, and heart monitors. Depending on the company, they might come out for free since they don’t want to be buying appliances. If that don’t work I’d contact an electrician. Phone companies are going broke with the advent of cell phones they don’t have money to spend chasing down potential issues. In MN anyways, phone is always grounded to your electrical service or the power company’s. Call power company, then electrician.

Thanks for the replies. Lots of wisdom shared. I appreciate the response.

TrapperKent

Are you at the end of the service line?

No, not at any end of the line. On a ridge, at the head of a hollow coming up from the river. Very tall phone tower about 200 yards from my house. Phone junction box less than a 1/4 of mile and it gets zapped occasionally. Going to carefully check the phone line ground at the location where it enters the house.

TrapperKent

Darn lightning. I'm not sure about how to prevent damage to a house by reducing the likelihood of a lightning strike, but I've known of folks that have actually had house fires from lightning.